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A PRAIRIE PRAYER 

AND OTHER POEMS 



BY 
HILTON R. GREER 

AUTHOR OF 

"THE SPIDERS and OTHER POEMS' 




BOSTON 
SHERMAN, FRENCH & COMPANY 

1912 






copykight, 1912 
Sherman, French & Company 



6CLA319013 



TO 

MY AUNT 
MRS. M. M. GREER 



FOREWORD 

Two poems which were included in 
an earlier collection are given place 
in this volume, with lenient revision. 
Others originally appeared in The 
Cosmopolitan, Lippincotfs, The 
Smart Set, The National, Sunset, 
Pacific Monthly, The Sunday School 
Times, The Pathfinder, and the New 
Orleans Times-Democrat. 

H. R. G. 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

A PRAIRIE PRAYER 1 

A SOUTHERN DUSK 4 

LET ME DRINK DEEPLY 5 

RIPPLE SONG 6 

PRAIRIE MOODS 9 

HEROES 11 

POE 12 

THE WAY OF LOVE 13 

FOR APRIL'S COMING 14 

JUDAS IN A MARKET-PLACE 16 

FOR A FLY-LEAF OF LANIER'S POEMS . . 18 

"WHOM THE GODS LOVE" 19 

WOOD-PATHS 

I "WHERE THE SHADOWS BIDE" . . 23 
II WHEN APRIL CALLS 25 

III THE CARDINAL AT BATH .... 26 

IV THERE BEAUTY STANDS .... 27 
V A MOCKBIRD MATINEE 28 

VI A LAKE AT EVENING 31 

VII A PAGAN MOOD 32 

VIII MIDNIGHT IN CAMP 34 

IX A HEALTH TO OCTOBER .... 35 

X WOODS BEFORE DAWN 37 

XI STARS OF THE DOGWOOD .... 38 

OHO, LAUGHED THE DEVIL 39 

DEATH IN THE HOUSE OF LIFE .... 41 
TO A BEE IN A FLORIST'S WINDOW ... 43 

HEY, MY LITTLE LADY 44 

THE MINOR POETS 46 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

SONG OF THE SPUR 47 

CACTUS BLOOMS 48 

LINES WRITTEN BENEATH POE'S "TO 

HELEN" 49 

THE GHOST OF THE GARDEN 50 

SLANDER 57 

SPRING ON THE COLORADO 58 

"TO-NIGHT MY HEART'S A HAUNTED ROOM" 59 
IF SOUND CLAIMED AUGHT OF COLOR . . 60 

AT MISSION SAN JOSE 61 

CAPE JASMINES 64 

COLOR 65 



A PRAIRIE PRAYER 
AND OTHER POEMS 



A PRAIRIE PRAYER 

"and this prayer I make, 
Knowing that Nature never did betray 
The heart that loved her." 

— Wordsworth. 

Not crouched, a-cloistered, upon servile knee, 
With dull, down-groping 1 eyes — 
But (no less reverently) 

Standing, beneath Thy searching noonday 
skies, 

With gaze uplifted, and with soul laid bare 

To the keen cleansing of Thy sun and air, 
I, Lord, with free, 

Full, frank, unfaltering tongue would speak 
with Thee : 

Worn with the world, with man-made wounds 
a-smart, 
That I might heal my heart 
To these wide prairie solitudes I fled, 
Where — with no roof save Heaven overhead, 
Green Earth my house by day, by night my 

bed— 
I might ungyve my soul, too long unfree, 
And with clear eye that did but dimly see 
Through the Time's trade-fogged, creed- 
clogged airs, 
Roving fair Nature's face, not unawares 



[1] 



Might look on Thine, Lord, nor blinded be: 
And with tense ear might heed 'neath Nature's 

tone 
The deepmost underword that is Thine own. 

And I have heard and seen Thee. Earth and 

sky, 

Close confidants of spirit-ear and eye, 

Noon-clear to me 
Have voiced and visioned Thee most humanly. 
Yea, e'en the least of slenderest spears that 

stir 
Sunward finds tongue as Thine interpreter: 
Blue blossom-script that stars the page I scan 
In fragrant phrase proclaims God loveth Man: 

And outward, lo ! 
Beyond all bounds the finite thought may span 
Sweep these vast plains, a seeming sea that 

rounds 
And rounds — on — on — in undulations dim 
Toward Earth's last, loneliest, utmost, edge- 
most rim ! 
Yet this wide, awful sea hath certain bounds — 
Thy will hath fixed, Thy hand hath set them 
so: 
Only Thy love, I know, 
For Thy poor, needy kinsman, cramped below, 



[2] 



Thy pity for his poignant soul-distress, 
Thy largeness, shaming all his littleness, 
Are what these prairies seem, unbounded, lim- 
itless ! 

This have Thy prairies taught. And ere I go 
Back to my world to bear a braver part, 
Let me ensky them ever with my heart ! 
Nay, Lord, refashion me, reshape me so, 

My soul, new-made, shall be 

A prairie, broad and free, 
With sun-warmed space for all Humanity : 
Let winds of Purpose sweep it clean each morn 
Of ills outworn and doubtings, shadow-born : 
Let Faith spring lushly after storms of pain 

As grasses after rain: 
Let selfless aim and generous intent 
Burst into blossom, rich and redolent : 
Let thoughts, like teeming flocks, find large 
increase, 

Full-rounded grow, and strong, 

That from their goodly fleece 

The honest weaver, Art, 
May shape some rare, enduring cloth of song, 
To cloak keen winter from one shrinking heart : 
And, lastly, let such deep serenity 
As this rapt peace of noonday fold it in 
Throughout all times of tumult that may be : 
Yea, make my soul a prairie, Lord. Amen. 



[3] 



A SOUTHERN DUSK 

The blue convolvulus of day 
Has hid its honeyed heart away, 

And, jasmine-like, the yellow stars 
Cling to the Dusk's dim trellis-bars, 

While ghostly through the purple gloom 
A moon-magnolia bursts to bloom ! 



[4] 



LET ME DRINK DEEPLY 

Let me drink deeply of my cup of days, 

To the last clinging drop — I shall not 
shrink : 
Mine are not craven lips that would but graze 
Where ruddy dimples dance along the brink : 
Nay, to the utmost dregs, e'en though they be 
More bitter than the harsh salt of the sea — 
I shall not falter — let me deeply drink ! 
Elsewise how may 
I call the chalice good on that sure day 
The Giver of the cup shall come this way? 



[5] 



RIPPLE SONG 

O. soft is the song of the ripples that run, 
Cool silver in shadow, warm gold in the sun ! 

0, lightly it slips 

From their lyrical lips, 
As lithely and blithely the swift current trips 

O'er the white-pebbled shoal 
Where slim alders glisten, a-lean as to listen, 
And cresses their crinklesome tresses unroll 

That their lovers may linger 

(With tremulant finger 
On finger enwound in the undulant mesh) 

Before turning afresh 
To their dance with the dragon-flies, frolic- 
some, fleet. 
Bearing with them a rhythm, elusively sweet : 

The children we 

Of the sun and sea, 
From the keep of the summer cloud set free 

To sing as we go 

In our ceaseless flow 
The gladdest songs that our glad lips know. 

Ere a dawn-wind stirs 

Mid the silken burrs 
Or twinkles a gem on the gossamers. 

We shimmer away 

Through the glimmery gray. 
Acreep past the dreaming wild-rose spray. 

[6] 



Leap the liveoak's root 

In a wild pursuit, 
One after one: but our lips are mute 

Till the gold breaks out : 

Then, with silvery shout 
And a jubilant dare to the dappled trout, 

We open the chase 

At a rollicking pace, 
Away and away in a headlong race, 

Ever fast, ever fast, 

Till the goal is past, 
And, spent with our speeding, we loiter at last 

Where the white Noon weaves 

On a grot's cool eaves 
The shadowy stars of the sweet-gum leaves: 

There the swallows skim 

At their wild-wing whim, 
And the redbird dips in our dimpled brim : 

The hawthorn droops, 

And in airy groups, 
Like frail flotillas of fairy sloops, 

Its spent snows rest 

On our limpid crest, 
Now swell, now sink, like a sleeper's breast: 

The gray squirrels glide 

By the water's side, 
With bantering word: yet we may not bide, 

But are off full soon 

With a drowsy croon 
Through the long, warm lapse of the afternoon, 

[7] 



While the whispering vine 

Of the muscadine 
Leans Ioav to lisp of its autumn wine, 

And moekbird calls 

From the ferny walls 
Are blurred with our babble of labials ; 

But when Dusk comes down 

In her silken gown, 
And faint lights blink in the distant town, 

Where the sly stars peep 

Through the brambles deep 
We lurk in the shadows, half-asleep; 

And when all is still 

Save the whippoorwill 
And the owl, a-hoot on the ghostly hill, 

The white moon-maid 

On her pearl couch laid, 
We woo to dreams with a serenade 

As silver-thin 

In its dulcet din 
As the lilt of a tinkling mandolin — 

Subdued and slow 

In its muffled flow 
As a mellow 'cello of Mexico. 

Ay, soft is the song of the ripples that run, 
Gray silver in starlight, brown gold in the sun ! 



[8] 



PRAIRIE MOODS 
I 

MID-MORNING 

A disembodied soul am I, 

Asleep on wanton wing, 
Exultant 'neath the morning sky 

O'er spaces sweet with Spring: 
A fellow of the larks that dare 
The crystal currents of the air, 

A comrade of the winds that run 
Amid the yellow blossoms, where 

Ten millions twinkle in the sun 
A rover with the butterfly — 
A disembodied soul am I ! 



[9] 



II 

MID-AFTERNOON 

I am grown stalwart in a single morn. 

No more am I the pigmy thing I was, 

The shrunk-souled weakling of a cramping 

age, 
But loosed from that warped shell of littleness 
Which was my Self's accustomed habitude, 
Full-pulsed, steel-sinewed, ruddy-hearted, I, — 
Grown broad and strong as these brave plains 

that stretch. 
Majestic, vast, to far infinitudes, 
Grown lofty-statured as the dim blue dome 
Of sky that scans the world : a Titan, I ! 
The sun hath claimed my comradeship : this 

morn. 
While purple courtiers thronged his eastern 

gate, 
He spoke me fellowly : my soul this night 
Shall hold rapt converse with the tongued 

spheres, 
And sit in council with the solemn stars. 
Let come what chance another day may bring 
To forge and shape new shackles for my soul, 
I am grown strong to snap them — for this day 
A creeping wordling walks, erect, — a god! 



[10] 



HEROES 

One dared to die. In a swift moment's space 
Fell in War's forefront, laughter on his face. 
Bronze tells his fame in many a market-place. 

Another^ dared to live. The long years 

through 
Felt his slow heart's blood ooze, like crimson 

dew, 
For Duty's sake, and smiled). And no one 

knew. 



[11] 



POE 

Meshed in midnight, misty-mooned, 

In a realm of men unwist, 
To a weird harp, tensely-tuned, 

Sings a mournful melodist — 
And his harpstrings are the tresses 

Of a maid whom Death hath kist. 

Demons from Hell's nether gloom-end, 

Seraphim on shimmering wings, 
Houris, dusk-eyed, star-illumined, 

Hover near him, as he sings 
And, with fingers half-unhumaned, 

Wakes the sobbing silken strings. 

Sweet — ah, deathly sweet ! — the music, 

Welling from his lips of doom, 
Velvet-soft as notes of vesper, 

Swooning in a haunted gloom — 
Strange as words young phantoms whisper 

In a hollow tomb. 

Weird — unearthly weird — the echoes 

Of each quivering cadence fled, 
Ghosts, foredoomed to sigh forever, 

Tremulous, unsilenced, 
Till Time falter, spent and breathless, 

And Death's self be dead. 



[12] 



THE WAY OF LOVE 

Joy, in princely palace hall, 

Made a feast for me: 

Bade a shining company 
To grace the golden festival ; 
Then, what time the wreathen wall 

Rang with mirth and melody, 
Proffered up 
A crystal cup, 
Sparkling with ambrosial wine; 
Love stood by with eyes a-shine : 

" Drink ! " he murmured eagerly. 

Wan-faced Sorrow bade me sup 

One gray eve with her: 
Bade me drain a darkling cup, 

Brimmed with bitter myrrh; 
But, or ere 'twas lifted up, 

Came a sudden stir, — 
Love my trembling fingers stayed 

(Infinite sweet sacrifice 

Shining from his yearning eyes) : 
"Nay, but let me drink!" he prayed. 



[13] 



FOR APRIL'S COMING 

All night the nimble fingers of the wind 

Were busy at their broidery — and lo! 

A tinted tracery of apple bloom 

Wrought on the orchard grass — soft tapestry 

Of shimmering velvet for the twinkling feet 

Of blue-eyed April days to dance upon ! 

This morn they're looked for. Nature hardly 

slept, 
So eager was her ear to catch the sound 
Of a first faintest footfall. Night's last 

hour — 
A brooding hour of hushed expectancy — 
Stood watch a-tiptoe, and with holden breath, 
While softly, like pale petals, one by one, 
The white stars faded, and the heavens grew 

sere 
With ashen grayness. But, at last, a flush — 
Pearl — pink — rose — gold — and Dawn awoke 

again ! 

Look where the little shadows leap and play 
Like laughing children ! Sudden whispers stir 
Where poplar leaves, blown silver in the sun, 
Hold gleeful gossip ; 'neath the old grey eaves 
The sparrows chirp brisk converse; from the 

hedge 
A bluebird whistles in wild wonderment; 

[14] 



Then silence for a tense, a listening space: 
What sound was that ? 'Twas April's step ! 

'Tis she- 
Spring's darling daughter ! Song's unleashed 

again, 
And grass and leaf and bloom and mounting 

sap . 
Grow palpitant with vernal ecstasy! 

O April ! Sweetheart sister from the South ! 
Can hearts keep silent when the very sod 
Cries out in lyric rapture at thy step? 
The earth puts on new garnishment for thee, 
Discards its wintry robe of somberness, 
And dons the glad habiliments of youth: 
So shall my soul put off its cloaking care, 
And leap, new-garmented in robes of joy, 
To greet thy presence with a sound of song! 



[15] 



JUDAS IN A TWENTIETH CENTURY 
MARKET-PLACE 

Jesus, Lord Christ, whom my betrayal kiss 
Gave to the frenzied rabble that mad throats 
Might taunt with curses, clamorous for Thy 

blood — 
Is it for naught, O Master, Lord my God, 
That through all years of endless, eating time, 
Doomed, damned and driven, my lost spirit 

roves, 
Wailing and wandering? My God, my God! 

Learned Man no lesson from my infamy? 
Lord Christ, unheeding, they betray Thee still ! 
Daily they sell Thee in the market-place, 
Gloat o'er their little silver, seeing not 
'Tis thickly, blackly crusted with Thy blood — 
Thy blood, Thy blood, O Christ !— for Thou art 

part 
Of all Humanity whose soul, betrayed 
To the remorseless rabble of this Time, 
Is crucified upon a cross of greed! 



[16] 



With swift, keen flame ope Thou their blinded 

eyes! 
Wake Conscience with ten million scorpion- 
tongues 
To sting them to such knowledge of their 

shame 
That they will toss their clotted silver by, 
And turn once more to Thee ! Not vainly then 
Wilt Thou have writhed upon a dripping cross, 
Not vainly shall my doomed and driven soul 
Wail through all years of endless, eating time ! 



[17] 



FOR A FLY-LEAF OF LANIER'S POEMS 

Not vainly drawn, O stainless chevalier, 
Thy sword of song at Beauty's high behest, 

Guarding her sacred shores from vandal 
wrong — 
While bitter Death smote ever at thy breast ! 

Though fallen in thy flower, O my prince, 

Of all Song's knightly court the knightliest! 
Love's time-enduring laurels wreathe thy 
name — 
Brave-souled Lanier! White Sidney of the 
West! 



[18] 



"WHOM THE GODS LOVE" 

When life lies spread before Youth's kindling 

eye, 

A field of valor to be stormed and won, 

While Youth's exemplar, a puissant sun, 

Mounts with strong feet of flame the morning 

sky: 
When every blood-beat is a bugle-cry, 
Keen-clamoring like a silver clarion, 
Shrilling to combat ere the hour be run : 
Make ready! Forward! Charge! Then — THEN 
— to die, 

At that tense, tingling height — with lifted blade 
Yet unencrimsoned, gleaming, were to claim 
The flush of triumph, not its withering 
wreath : 
To know but knightly strife, not ambuscade, 
Mine, pitfall, treachery — nor defeat's hot 
shame, 
Nor conqueror, save indomitable Death ! 



[19] 



WOOD-PATHS 



"What's the good of singing ?"- 

Do I hear you say? — 
"Earth's dull ears are sordid, 

Stopped with gilded clay. 
When none will hear or heed it 

Why keep singing, pray?" 
Just for joy of singing — 

That's the wood-bird's way! 



[21] 



"WHERE THE SHADOWS BIDE" 

So cool and shadowy and sweet ! 
I wonder if some dreamer's feet 

Back on a soft blue morn in May 

First traced each dim and winding way? 

Ay, surely ! Never step more rude 
Might pierce wild Beauty's solitude, 

For these are paths where dreamers still 
May loiter, lagging as they will — 

Where, beaconing at every turn, 
The blossoms of the buckeye burn, 

And where the elfin wood-winds strow 
The sward with drifting hawthorn snow, 

Flinging faint odors as they pass 
Of grape and subtle sassafras : 

Or else, outstretched beneath the pines, 
May marvel at the frail designs 

Of delicate and spidery gold, 
Sun-woven on the tufted mold: 

[23] 



And list — while echoes falter mute — 
Low-cadenced as some sobbing flute, 

The wood-dove's mournful interlude, 
So soft with sorrow and subdued, 

So sad and sweet, unearthly sweet, 

That eyes grow dim and hushed hearts beat 

With raptures, holy as if wings 

Of angels swept the throbbing strings. 



[24] 



II 

WHEN APRIL CALLS 

When April calls, and hill and coppice ring 
With rapture at the silver summoning, 
Wild echoes wake in solitudes serene 
Where drooping dogwood boughs that overlean 
Startle the slopes with sudden blossoming. 

The light-lipped ripples through the shallows 

sing, 
The tremulous tassels of the willows swing, 
And coverts dim grow glimmeringly green, 
When April calls. 

O brooding heart ! Pluck out the venomed 

sting 
Of poignant sorrow ! Set caged Care a-wing ! 
Old ardors burn the blood and, coursing clean, 
Thrill sluggish pulses with an impulse keen 
To follow fleet the flying feet of Spring 
When April calls ! 



[25] 



Ill 

THE CARDINAL AT BATH 

Hist ! here's His Lordship ! Look you where he 

darts 
Swift as a crimson arrow from the copse, 
Skims o'er the grassy slope with wings half 

spread, 
And, where the wood-brook leaps the stepping 

stones 
With sudden swirl of silver, makes descent, 
Scans with approving eye the pool's expanse 
Of limpid coolness : then, all daintily, 
And with unconscious grace, dips softly in : 
This wing — now that — now both — and head — 

and breast — 
Rises again with plumage fluttering, 
Regains his vantage stone: with practiced flirt 
Flings every side a shower of crystal spray ! 

Sir Artist, here is beauty that defies 
The magic of your brush ! So wild, so free, 
Art may not claim it. Best preserve the sketch, 
Limned in its cool, clean freshness on your 

soul, 
A scarlet study on a restful ground 
Of shadowed silver, shot with golden lights. 
Call it— why, yes,— "The Cardinal at Bath." 



[26] 



IV 

THERE BEAUTY STANDS 

I know a tranquil temple in the pines, 
A shadow-haunted and a holy place, 
Where through thick boughs that arch and 
overlace 
Noon's warmest gold with softened splendor 

shines. 
Moss-muffled stretch the aisles, and coiling 
vines 
Wrap the low altar with a glooming grace 
While the slow hours come with reverent 
pace, 
Like pious pilgrims to their old-world shrines. 

There Beauty stands with finger tremblingly 
Lifted to hushing lips a tingling while, 
Till at the tender signal of her smile 

The tongues of silence waken, clear and free, 
And sounding nave and echoing transept 

ring 
With jubilate of glad worshiping! 



[27] 



V 

A MOCKBIRD MATINEE 

Ever spend an afternoon 
Of a day in jocund June 
At a mockbird matinee? 
Never? Honest? Well-a-day ! 
Where've you lived, sir, anyway? 

There's no hint of trade or town 
In the path one loiters down ; 
Not a thought of shops or desks 
Where the sun weaves arabesques, 
Fragile-fair and fairy-hued, 
In the wood's still solitude; 
Not a thing but God's pure air, 
Shine and shadow everywhere ! 

Pick yourself a mossy seat 
In some dim and cool retreat, 
And, with sighs of deep content, 
Settle down, all indolent, 
With your head against the trunk 
Of some hoary forest monk : 
Bare your forehead while the breeze 
Plies its gentle ministries : 
Close your eyes in rapture deep, 
Feel yourself grow sleepy — sleep — 
Then — a-sudden — hist ! a stir 
From some hidden chorister, 
[28] 



As along a branching spray 

Where the sunbeams plash and play 

Fares he forth in modest coat, 

Flinging from his throbbing throat 

Clear cascades of tinkling song, 

Silver-sweet and subtle-strong: 

Strains' of soul-compelling sound, 

Streams of symphony unbound: 

Lures of lyric riotry, 

Miracles of melody, 

Soft at times, and sweet and low 

As the slow and measured flow 

Of some placid river-tide 

Through warm meadows, lush and wide 

Or from breast aflame, afire, 

Wild with passion, hot desire, 

High and high and high and higher 

Leap the frantic notes until 

Fen and forest, haunt and hill, 

Pulse and pant and throb and thrill, 

Overawed and overcome 

By the keen delirium ! 

Then, as if such riotings 
Had consumed symphonic springs, 
For a solemn space — a hush! 
But once more a rhythmic gush, 
Flashing downward, fleet and free, 
Mad with mirthful minstrelsy : 

[29] 



Ravishing the raptured ear 
With a cadence, crystal-clear 
As the laugh of limpid rain 
In autumnal fields of grain: 
Stilling spirit-strife and stress 
With a rune of restfulness : 
Purging blood and breast and brain 
Of their poignant pangs of pain: 
Rousing noble aims and true 
In the slumbrous soul of you ! 



[30] 



VI 
A LAKE AT EVENING 

Above its brim the hawthorn droops 

A mist of blossomed snow: 
Guarding its shores, like shadowy troops 

The spectral alders show. 

The dim lake dreams : its silver rest 

No lightest zephyr mars ; 
Like clustered pearls upon its breast 

Are looped the sleeping stars. 

O soul of mine! when broodingly 
Dusk hovers o'er Life's scene, 

Like this dim wood-lake, may'st thou be 
Pellucid and serene. 



[31] 



VII 

A PAGAN MOOD 

World, go worship as you will: 
I am but a pagan still. 

You may mouth your little creeds, 
Chant your anthems, count your beads, 

Underneath your temple's roof: 
I, from towns and spires aloof, 

Just for one soft Sabbath day 
Worship in the ancient way. 

Gone the shrines of pagan folk, 
Blown the sacrificial smoke: 

But a sentient something clings 
Of the old imaginings, 

So that sward and sky for me 
Wear the guise " of deity : 

Hoary hill and rugged pine 
Own a majesty divine: 

And in shadows soft and dim 
Lo, I bow and worship them ! 

[32] 



Scoff, you moderns, an you will, 
I am but a pagan still, 

Clinging to a faith that is 
Old as all Earth's goodnesses : 

He who, in her myriad forms 

(Sea and cloud and stars and storms, 

Spreading bough and springing clod,) 
Worships Beauty, worships God. 



[33] 



VIII 

MIDNIGHT IN CAMP 

'Tis midnight in the immemorial wood. 
High overhead the constellations dream, 
Cradled in cloud ; above them, mother-wise, 
Bends a pale moon in sweet solicitude. 
All Nature slumbers. In yon tent that looms 
Ghost-dimly in the camp-fire's flickering 
My comrades lie, outworn with weariness, 
Soothed with rapt visions of the morrow's hunt. 
The roving winds are still. The owl has hushed 
His hollow hooting in the haunted copse. 
The river's voice, that on the pebbly shoals 
Made low and plaintive murmuring, is dumb 
As lips in death. The wilderness is wrapt 
In silence so intense, inviolate, 
That acorns, pattering in the muffled aisles, 
And eerie whisperings of loosened leaves, 
Adrift in eddying circles to my feet, 
Seem to profane it with unholy sound. 
Hush, my heart I We are alone with God! 



[34] 



IX 

A HEALTH TO OCTOBER 

Here's a health to October, dream-sandaled 

October, 
Queen of the quiet lands, dusk-eyed and 

sober, — 
Long be the reign of her, gladsome and good ! 
The fay folk have kept her 
A goldenrod scepter, 
Have raised her a throne in a deep solitude, 
Where crisp, crinkled, dead leaves, gold-dappled 
and red leaves 
Mellowly, 
Yellowly, 
Flame in the wood. 

Long stilled is the singing, the silvery singing, 
Of brooks that down June-lands tripped 

blithely, outflinging 
Notes soft as the chimes of a clear-cadenced 
bell; 
The quail's shrill insistence 
Has died in the distance : 
Sabbatical silence wraps all in its spell, 
Save when through the hushes some brown- 
throated thrush's 
Lyrical 
Miracle 
Drifts from the dell. 
[35] 



So, a health to October, dream-sandaled Oc- 
tober, 
Queen of the quiet lands, dusk-eyed and sober, 
Long be the reign of her, gladsome and good, 
And dark days not seek her! 
Up, up with a beaker! 
A health to October ! I pledge her again ! 
A beaker of darkling, warm-beaded and spar- 
kling 
Muscadine 
Dusky wine, 
Bright to her reign! 



[36] 



X 

WOODS BEFORE DAWN 

Faint as a footfall in some house of death, 
Weird as a whisper from some haunted 
shore — 

Listen! a ghostly step re-echoeth 
Along the forest floor. 

Is it some restless leaf that wearily 

Paccth till dawn his chamber, gloomy-aisled, 

Or Summer's ghost that glideth eerily 
Where once her glad lips smiled? 



[37] 



XI 
STARS OF THE DOGWOOD 

Stars of the dogwood, burning white 

Through the dusk of my southern wood, 

Aprils ago how you thrilled my sight 
And quickened my singing blood! 

Ah, in the hush of an evening gloam, 
When the pageant of life is past, 

Stars of the dogwood, lead me home 
To sleep in the shade at last ! 



[38] 



OHO, LAUGHED THE DEVIL 

"Oho," laughed the Devil, "Oho-ho-ho-ho !" 

(And he chuckled full low 

As he paced to and fro 

In the sulphurous glow 

That his furnaces throw) 
"There'll still be some fuel for fires here below !" 

Scoffed good Mistress Devil: "And how do you 
know?" 

"How?" echoed the Devil, suppressing his 

mirth ; 
"My dear, it is simple. 
To-day as I strolled through the streets of the 

Earth 
I chanced on a temple 
Where men came to worship : the gold of its 

spire 
In the clear light of noon made a shimmer of 

fire 
And the song of its choir 
Through the echoing transepts swelled higher 

and higher 
In a love-tide of sweetness that swept all the 

bad 
From the souls of the wicked, that solaced the 

sad 
And made the dull hearts of the sordid grow 

glad. 

[39] 



But the good parson's sermon soon shattered 

the spell ; 
His theme it was FIRE — insofar as could tell 
His sore-frighted flock — and he handled it well, 
For he dangled their feet o'er the cauldrons 
of Hell, 
And a brimstony smell 
Wrapt the deep-warning words from his lips, 
as they fell. 
And that's why I know 
That we'll not want for fuel for fires here be- 
low !" 

Quoth Dame Devil: "Why so?" 

"Because He whom we combat, the great God 
above, 

Is Love Most Immortal, and rules but by love ; 

They who serve Him through love, and glad- 
hearted, shall stand 
At His shining right hand: 

They who serve Him through fear serve not 
wisely nor well: 

Fears the dim aisle that leads to the trap-door 
of Hell! 
And that's why I know 

That we'll not lack for fuel for fires here be- 
low !" 

So "Oho," laughed the Devil, "Oho-ho-ho-ho !" 

[40] 



DEATH IN THE HOUSE OF LIFE 

Prithee, come in, friend Death, and chat with 
me. 
Think not, old neighbor, that I dread o'er- 

much 
Thy chilling clasp. My soul's not spun of 
such 
Un-Spartan stuff that I should shrink from 

thee : 
Nay ! sit thee down, and keep me company. 

'Tis true this House of Life wherein I dwell 
Grants feeble shelter from the keening gusts 
Of wintry woe; 'tis true I feed on crusts 
While others feast. Yet in this cramping cell 
I have known gladness : and I love it well. 

'Tis but a little journey through the night, 
A little journey down a shadowy road, 
Ere the white portals of thy hushed abode 

(Whence comes no sound, nor glimmering of 
light) 

Rise restfully before the wearied sight. 

There dreamless slumber waits the wayworn 

guest, 

And sweet forgetfulness of scar and sting 

Left by the scorpion years : and solacing 

For all fierce passion-fires that seared the 

breast 
With eating flame. There, waits eternal rest. 
[41] 



Yet would I bide a little longer here, 

Where Youth's red roses blossomed round 

the door 
And Jo} T 's glad sunlight danced along the 
floor : 
Where Mirth woke music in a yester-year 
And Memory makes each dingy rafter dear. 

For life, at bitter worst, seems sweet to me: 
Each cup of sorrow holds some nectar still: 
White Beauty blows in April on my sill: 

And Want's grim winter brings slight pangs — 
for see! 

Warm on my hearth Love's flame leaps ruddily. 



[42] 



TO A BEE IN A FLORIST'S WINDOW 

Sad rover, from thy native heath beguiled, 
Do the false kisses of a pampered rose, 
Upon whose cheek but hectic color glows, 

Thrill thee, as did the warm lips of the wild 

Hedge-roses, or their sisters pink who smiled 
Above the singing brook? Ah, one who knows 
A captive's longings, shares thy secret woes — 

Poor prisoner! He, too, is Nature's child. 

He, too, has quaffed from cups of eglantine, 
Has known the fragrance of the flowery 
mead, 
The wide, blue sky, the morning's pre- 
scient stir; 
Has beaten frantic wings, as thou dost thine, 
'Gainst cruel windows, struggling to be 
freed, 
And been, like thee, the city's prisoner! 



[43] 



HEY, MY LITTLE LADY 

TO A LITTLE GIRL's rORTRAIT, ON WAKING 

Hey, my little lady, with the laughter in your 
eyes, 
And lips like wee primped petals with sun- 
beam smiles a-race ! 
Just three's the sum of summers since you 
twinkled from the skies, 
Little Lady April, with the springtime in 
your face — 
O hey, my little lady, in the morning! 

Ah, dear my little lady, in a summer that I 
know, 
When the soul of me was darkest, though I 
laughed with many men, 
When the torch of Hope was dimmest and the 
fires of Faith were low 
Your kisses came and coaxed them into full- 
est flame again ! 
For God was good to send you to heart that 
hungered so — 
So bless you, little lady, in the morning ! 



[44] 



And O, my little lady, though the weary, dreary 
miles 
Withhold you from the older arms that miss 
you, miss you so — 
Still I keep your April glances and the sun- 
light of your smiles, 
And my soul forgets its burdens in the glad- 
ness of the glow 
Of your pictured face that greets me when 
the mists of slumber go — 
God love you, little lady, every morning! 



[45] 



THE MINOR POETS 

Shall Spring disown the simple wayside spar- 
row 

Because the lark, on pinions fleet and strong 
Cleaving the cloud, a swift upwinging arrow, 

Pierces her skies with song? 

Shall Morning from the sparkling lyric treas- 
ure 
Her wood-brook flings her turn in cold dis- 
dain 
Because the sea in deep, sonorous measure 
Moans out its ancient pain? 

Shall Earth deride the host whose simpler sing- 
ing 
Tells but the lowly secrets of the heart 
Because some loftier strain sets Heaven ring- 
ing 
Round all the peaks of Art? 

Ah, no! despite the sneers of critics carping, 
Spring needs her sparrow's chirp in bosk 
and brake: 
Morning her brook-song: Earth the hopeful 
harping 
Her minor minstrels wake ! 



[46] 



SONG OF THE SPUR 

O, it's ho and hey, for the wind-swept way 

And the breath of the open trail, 
Ere the East is stirred with a ripple of rose 

Or the yellow stars grow pale! 

And it's hey and ho, for the beating sun 
And the slash of the slanting rain, 

For the singing grass and the stinging speed 
And the sweep of the stretching plain ! 

O, it's ho and hey, when the frenzied steers 
Rush down in a thundering rank, 

To the head of the herd — while my hungry 
teeth 
Bite blood from the foaming flank! 

And it's hey and ho, when the Dusk has set 

Faint lamps in her turrets high, 
Homeward again where a far light calls 

Under a tingling sky ! 



[47] 



CACTUS BLOOMS 

Lo, what wild beauty the dawn doth disclose ! 

Beauty new-born 

Of the clustering thorn, 
Silkenly scarlet and satiny rose ! 

Life, so I muse, like a cactus grows, 
Thorny (God's pity!) with infinite woes: 

But Beauty and Love 

Are the blossoms thereof, 
Silkenly scarlet and satiny rose. 



[48] 



LINES WRITTEN BENEATH POE'S "TO 
HELEN" 

O, sculptor of the subtly-carven phrase ! 

How stately stands thy Helen — chaste, di- 
vine, 

Yet -softly beautiful, as if were thine 
The chisel-cunning of Praxiteles ! 



[49] 



THE GHOST OF THE GARDEN 

It was here in this dim old garden 
Where a weird white moon-tide flows, 

That the red life slipped from a woman's heart 
Like the leaves from a crimson rose. 

'Tis a tale that is tender with pathos, 
Too deep for the touch of tears, 

Of a love that lives though the lovers sleep 
In the dust of the drifted years. 

Mathilde was a Southron's daughter, 
With eyes that were dark with dream 

And brown as the sunken shadows 
In the depths of an autumn stream. 

Light-limbed as a sandaled sunbeam, 
She danced through the wide old halls, 

And her voice was as soft as the singnno" 
Of birds when the twilight falls. 

Caressed by the speeding summers, 

She oped like a blossom wild, 
Till her form wore the fullness of woman 

Though it harbored the soul of a child. 

Yet deep at the core of her being, 
Like an ember, imbosomed in snow, 

Slept passion that waited the coming of love 
To burst into tropical glow. 
[50] 



Love came, as Love comes to the lovely, 
All swiftly and strange and sweet, 

Transforming the world to a wild-rose way, 
Outspread for her joyous feet. 

Armand was a soldier's grandson ; 

Like 4he best of his blood he stood 
As straight and strong as the proud young 
pine 

That grew in his southern wood. 

And oft through this dim old garden 
They strolled in the dusks of June, 

While their blood beat time to the fountain's 
chime 
As it sang to' the summer moon. 

And there where that dark magnolia 
Flings shadow, she used to stand 

And answer the signals her lover made 
With a wave of her snowy hand. 

But their bowl that was brimmed with blisses 

Rudely to earth was hurled 
When the sullen thunders of Sumter's guns 

Pealed hoarse through the startled world. 

For soon every slope in the Southland 

Was ringing with War's alarms ; 
Wild rumors raced rife, while the shrilling 
fife 
Woke a clamorous call To arms! 
[51] 



In the bosom of Armand slumbered 

The soul of his martial sire, 
And it leaped to life when the trumpet-blast 

Fanned his hot blood to fire. 

He was swift to the front at the summons : 
Unsheathing his grandsire's sword, 

He rushed away to the reeking fields 
Where the red-mouthed cannon roared. 

He left on a summer Sabbath 

At the head of a valiant band, 
And Mathilde stood here in the gardenside, 

And waved with a snowy hand. 

And she smiled farewell though her vision 
Was blurred with a blinding rain, 

And her heart found voice in her bleeding breast 
And shrieked in its poignant pain. 

Thenceforth in this dim old garden 
She strolled through the dusk alone, 

But the once glad rhyme of the fountain's 
chime 
Seemed sunk to a lyric moan. 

The lips of the swaying roses, 

The birds in the boughs above, 
And the wind in the jasmines whispered low 

The name of her absent love. 

[52] 



Each night she dreamed of her Armand, 

With his face to the starry sky, 
With his eyes a-stare and his lips a-cold — 

And she woke with a wailing cry ! 

Ah, God! 'twas the Southern woman 

Who tied in the battle's brunt ! 
Through the weary weeks how her heart dripped 
death 

Through fear for the men at front ! 

One day from the Old Dominion 

Where the blood-drenched slopes ran red, 

A letter came from her soldier-love : 
"Heart of my heart," it said: 

"A fortnight more, and on furlough 
I'm coming back home and to you ; 

Ah, wait for me, sweet, in the gardenside, 
And wave as you used to do." 

Rare gold dawned the day of his coming, 
Like a cup overspilling with bliss, 

And her red lips trembled and yearned and 
burned 
For the warmth of his clinging kiss. 

And she watched from this dim old garden 

Where her face like a flower glowed, 
But the long day waned, and there came no 
sign 
From the bend in the yellow road. 
[53] 



Then her heart framed a thousand questions, 

And echoed the thousand anew: 
"What kept him — her Armand, her life, her 
love ? 

Dear Christ! had her dreams come true?" 

At dusk came a flying horseman, 
Spurred on with the speed of Fate : 

Was it Armand? Nay! a stranger in gray 
Drew rein at the garden gate. 

Ah ! cruel the message he brought her ! 

Like a hero her lover fell, 
With his sword waved high at the head of his 
men, 

Full charge into flaming hell ! 

And he spoke with his dying whisper 
Of a dark-eyed maid who would stand 

In a garden dim, and would watch for him 
And wave with her snowy hand. 

Then the face of Mathilde went ashen 
As the sky when the sunset goes, 

And the red life slipped from her woman's 
heart 
Like the leaves from a crimson rose. 

Not a sound, not a moan escaped her ; 

Death-dumb were her lips and drawn ; 
But the light of her mind was forever dimmed, 

Though the love of her soul lived on. 
[54] 



Years passed, but they passed unheeded ; 

She cared not, or slow, or fast, 
For she lived in the years that were dear and 
dead, 

The years of her fragrant past. 

And each day at the selfsame hour 
In the garden shade she would stand, 

A-watch for a stir at the bend of the road, 
And wave with her snowy hand. 

They found her here in the moonlight, 
She had fallen asleep in the dusk, 

While her soul went seeking its dearer soul, 
Outslipped from its shrunken husk. 

Long years has her dust been dreaming, 
Long years 'neath the southern sun, 

But a ghost still glides through the garden- 
side 
Ere the dusk of each day is done. 

And strange! since her soul went winging 
Through the shadows of night alone, 

Each year on the dark magnolia boughs 
But one pale blossom ha& blown. 

See ! there in the misty moonlight 
By the wall where she used to stand, 

One pallid bloom in the twilight waves 
Like a woman's snowy hand! 
[55] 



For thirty Junes in this garden, 

Where her face like a flower glowed, 
It has waved — and waved — but there comes no 
sign 
From the bend in the yellow road. 



[56] 



SLANDER 

Hid at the white-rose heart of fair repute 
You rob its petals of their honeyed smell : 

You gnaw the sweet from Honor's rarest 
fruit — 
Insidious black canker-worm from Hell ! 



[57] 



SPRING ON THE COLORADO 

Through all the echoing aisles to-day 
A blithe wind whistles like a boy ; 

The long gray mosses swing and sway, 
The ripples sing a song of joy. 

Here, where my live-oak, leaning o'er 
To scan the quiet pool's expanse, 

Sees, gliding down the crystal floor, 
The leaves in rhythmic shadow-dance, 

Outstretched on silken sward I lie, 
And while I quaff from lyric streams 

Low flute notes from some covert nigh 
Make music for my April dreams. 

Above me bends a sky as soft 

As Love's deep eyes when rapture-wet ; 
Afar the dark hills lift aloft 

Their misted peaks of violet. 

The Time's mad fever throbs not here 
Where slow white sunbeams filter down, 

It pulses yonder, where uprear 
The clustered towers of the town. 

But here the truant dreamer flees 
A cramping world of little men ; 

Beneath these brave, unselfish trees, 

Clasps heart with good, warm earth again. 
[58] 



"TO-NIGHT MY HEART'S A HAUNTED 
ROOM" 

To-night my heart's a haunted room, 

By one weird taper lit, 
And ceaselessly athwart the gloom 

Death-footed phantoms flit. 

Ah, ghosts of dear dim dreams that were 
In days long dead — long dead ! 

How the deep-sleeping echoes stir 
Beneath your soundless tread ! 



[59] 



IF SOUND CLAIMED AUGHT OF COLOR 

If sound claimed aught of color, unto me 
Deep, brooding grey would be 
The sobbing of the sea: 

And down dim aisles the mockbird's midnight 
strain 
Of passion and of pain 
Would waft a purple stain. 



[60] 



AT MISSION SAN JOSE 

In this hushed heart of ruin the dead Past 

sleeps, 
Heedless that Time's incessant, soft, slow feet 
Are beating stone on stone to drifting dust; 
Round' the grey forehead of each carven saint 
(As if some lost dream of Corregio's 
Had in a reverent sunset found its soul) 
Quiver faint aureoles of pallid flame : 
And ere they fade to wraiths of dimmest gold 
Comes one who walks ofttimes his little day 
With strange, half-alien footsteps — comrading 
With days long tombed and morrows yet en- 

wombed — 
To drink the scene with worshipful rapt gaze; 
And swift as if by phantom fingers rent 
The somber curtains of two centuries 
Before his vision sever silently — 
And lo! how bravely 'mid the western wild 
A staunch young Mission stands ! 

Through glimmering panes 
The tremulous glow of flickering tapers sifts, 
And, velvet-echoing on the listening air, 
A vesper bell with softly solemn tongue 
Summons the swart Franciscan unto prayer, 
While from the crouching gloom a savage 

creeps, 
Wild wonder on his face: and sacred-sweet 
As some blurred cadence of forgotten song 
Outwells low worship from the chapel's heart. 
[61] 



Then the swift curtains close — and greyness 

bides : 
Grey ruin, grey dreams, and, deepening every 

side, 
Grey sunset shadows, silkening to dusk. 

Yonder, clear-limned against a brooding sky, 
Vibrant, erect, alert, as if a-watch 
Beside the sepulchred and mouldering Past, 
Marconi's wizard-child, the Present, stands. 



E'en thus" — the Dreamer's soul finds voice- 



«i?» 



«<^' 



e en 



thus 



Hath Man, whose soaring genius rivals God's, 
Shackled the tempest, taught the lightning's 

tongue 
To frame in human-wise such potent speech 
One whispered word may wake the utmost 

shores 
Beyond the thunderous spaces of the seas: 
To-morrow's sun shall see him, swift and strong, 
Mount the blue morning with a falcon's wing 
To speak his neighbors of the wheeling 

worlds !" 
Thus far Man's mind, but hath his heart kept 

pace ? 



[62] 



"Nay !" — but the voice protests — "its steps are 

sure, 
Groping perchance a dim and tortuous way, 
But ever upward, sunward, unto light : 
Even to-day, though sordid eyes see not, 
Blind Selfishness and Ignorance and Greed, 
Corroding like these old grey Mission walls, 
Are crumbling, crumbling, steadily to doom: 
Let but a few more years on forward feet 
Tread over them, and these shall fall to dust, 
And free winds scatter them to nothingness ; 
Enlightenment and Tolerance and Truth 
Shall lift like towers in our ampler sky, 
Far-flashing to the peoples of all lands 
Good tidings of that goodlier dawn to be, 
When none shall have dominion o'er his kind: 
When Each shall labor for the weal of All: 
And each shall quaff as from a common fount 
To fullness of pure Knowledge, living Art, 
And that true Christliness which knows no 

creed : 
Then, imaged inly like his Maker, God, 
And stepping with his soul side to the sun, 
Man shall be Man indeed!" 



[63] 



CAPE JASMINES 

White as the holiest thoughts of angels be! 
Fragrant as kisses from Love's sleeping 

mouth ! 
Swift, at your touch, pale blossoms of the 

South, 
Rises the wraith of long-dead Memory ! 

Then — tears ! Yes, tears ; for when I lift you so, 
And to my brow your snowy petals press, 
I dream — ah, God ! — it is the old caress 

Of soft, white, lingering fingers, long ago! 



[64] 



COLOR 

The wine that yields no luster as it flows 

Grants little lingering sweetness to the taste ; 

The garden seems a bleak, a cheerless waste, 
When Autumn steals the redness of its rose; 
The sculptured marble's classic-browed repose 

Quickens no gazer's pulse-beat (howso 
graced) — 

But the live blood goes leaping, eager-paced, 
Before some canvas where rich color glows. 

Life without color is but life in name — 

A tasteless wine, a scentless rose and cold, 
A sculptured blank, a canvas drab and 
dull: 
Ah, that it woke in dawn of ruddy flame, 
Passed in a noontide pageantry of gold, 
And lapsed in sunset, warm and beautiful! 



[65] 



JUL 9 I9U 



